The Rock's five (at least!) secret half siblings

[King of Summer Kamala]

Cover story of SI.com today by Greg Oliver.

DNA says that Rocky Johnson was their dad—and The Rock is their half brother - Sports Illustrated

This is the story of a WWE Hall of Famer’s children, scattered across Canada, and the family they rediscovered.

www.si.com

Geez, I guess wrestlers really got around back in the territory days.

 

[Epic for the Summer]

I thought Rocky Johnson having a secret family was common knowledge? Or is this more kids he didn't know about?

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

It's five more kids he didn't know about. They mention his already known secret family in passing.

I wonder if The Rock's extraordinary and very public displays of generosity (and friendship & business relationship with his ex-wife) are at least subconsciously some way of making up for his dad's tomcat ways?

I also always forget Rocky Johnson is Canadian. No wonder why Bret Hart loved The Rock so much.

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

So it's worse than we thought. Someone at KM just posted an article from 2000 talking about how Rocky got fired from a community center for inviting a 12 year old to play strip poker (and generally being a serial harasser creep).

EX-WRESTLER AT CENTER OF FUROR OVER SEX ALLEGATIONS

www.sun-sentinel.com

Yikes. How quickly are they going to write Rocky Johnson off of Young Rock?

(It's funny that the town mayor name was Venis. I forgot that and was like "What does his son's co-worker have to do with any of this?")

 

[BruiserBrody]

So it's worse than we thought. Someone at KM just posted an article from 2000 talking about how Rocky got fired from a community center for inviting a 12 year old to play strip poker.

EX-WRESTLER AT CENTER OF FUROR OVER SEX ALLEGATIONS

www.sun-sentinel.com

Yikes. How quickly are they going to write Rocky Johnson off of Young Rock?

(It's funny that the town mayor name was Venis. I forgot that and was like "What does his son's co-worker have to do with any of this?")

Brian Last mentions this just about every time they cover Young Rock.

His interview with Greg Price also revealed the Rock would give his dad a million dollars each birthday.

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

I wonder if the real reason The Rock won’t run for office is cause he doesn’t want his family dirt dredged up in the mainstream media. Isn’t there some stuff on his mom being a sleaze, Brode?

 

[Epic for the Summer]

Meltzer reported when Rocky passed away that him and Dwayne were sort of estranged during the last years of his life. He told a story about attending the premiere for Be Cool (which would have been 2005) and telling the Rock that his Dad was having a signing the same night which he brushed off and told Dave he has no idea what his dad does anymore.

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

Reason that Rocky Johnson's autobiography that came out a year or two before he died was pulled off the market was because Rocky demanded his co-author ghostwrite the foreword that was said to have been written by The Rock (who wanted nothing to do with his dad ATT). The Rock's lawyers made them pull the book off of the market.

Then Rocky completely stiffed aforementioned co-author on payment.

Starting to think Rocky was not a v. good person!

 

[alkeiper]

Elder Rocky being a shitbag has kind of been known for quite some time, IIRC.

 

[snuffbox]

A WWE hall of famer being a dirty weirdo is not a presidential disqualifier but I'm not sure how it'd work for a son.

 

[Epic for the Summer]

This is why I'm always shocked to see Rocky portrayed in such a positive light on Young Rock. Sure, he was still his father and I'm sure there were a lot of good years between them but figured Dwayne wouldn't want his dad's shady past being dredged up. Maybe this is him doing damage control for his image?

 

[alkeiper]

The easy answer is that is what Dwayne saw as a child.

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

Elder Rocky being a shitbag has kind of been known for quite some time, IIRC. I think there was domestic abuse stuff out there as well but I can't find an immediate source.

I knew he wasn't a great family man but I just thought he was a scuzzy but generally harmless old time wrestler not someone that veered into harassment and abusive behavior.

But I mean that story about him being fired for being a creepy old perv was published in a metropolitan area newspaper 22 years ago so I guess a lot of it was swept under the rug.

 

[alkeiper]

I looked into all Rocky Johnson mentions in the Observer from 1991-98 and nothing, so I'm going to rescind that comment.

 

[Super Leather]

I think I read about Rocky Johnson's behavior in a review of a Tony Atlas shoot interview like 20 years ago. They hated each other and got in fights constantly. Rocky did all kinds of sketchy shit to maintain his freebase habit. Although Rocky was intimidated by Ata's parents, he became abusive to his family after the addiction took hold. Atlas talked a LOT of shit about Rocky in this interview apparently; I wish I could remember more of what he said in detail.

That review may or may not still exist on the old board's archives.

 

[King of Summer Kamala]

Are Rocky Johnson & Tony Atlas the most notable tag team that absolutely hated each other's guts IRL?

I'm sure there are some other examples I'm forgetting.

 

[Super Leather]

I should've looked up the Tony Atlas shoot review first...

He starts going off on Rocky for various things like never picking him up when they were supposed to ride together, etc. It came to a head when Tony did his finisher on their opponent that night and let Rocky take the pin, but Rocky pulled the guy up before the three and continued wrestling him. He claims that he punched Rocky out after that because it he felt Rocky was intentionally trying to kill his finisher.

They won the belts on the last day of TV before Vince Sr. died and claims that Vince Sr. made a big deal about wanting to put a belt on Tony before he died. Road agent Chief Jay Strongbow pushed for SD Jones to be Tony’s partner but Rocky got the spot instead because High Chief Peter Maivia, Rocky’s father-in-law, had just died. He claims they only teamed up twice, to win the belts and to lose the belts. He says that happened because he couldn’t stand Rocky and would punch him in the face whenever they ran into each other.

Rocky Johnson- “Rocky was anything but black.” If you were black, he’d screw you over because he wanted to keep his spot as the top black guy in the territory. He goes into a story about how they were supposed to be riding together to go to the TV tapings at a time when Vince Sr. was fining people $500 for being late to the tapings, but he couldn’t get Rocky to come out of his hotel room. He knew Rocky was in there because The Rock, then known as Dewey, was peeking out the window. Once they finally leave, he notices that a car is following them. He claims that it was Rocky’s girlfriend and that he was trying to keep his wife from finding out about her. He says Rocky tried to lay the blame on him by saying “I had to wait for Tony to get out of the gym”, so Tony whipped Rocky’s ass. They ended up taking the titles off of them because one of them was going to die if they were at each other’s throats long enough.

 

[BruiserBrody]

This is why I'm always shocked to see Rocky portrayed in such a positive light on Young Rock. Sure, he was still his father and I'm sure there were a lot of good years between them but figured Dwayne wouldn't want his dad's shady past being dredged up. Maybe this is him doing damage control for his image?

I'd argue the opposite and say Rocky is shown to be a carny, crooked has been in anything past 84 and before that there is the story of him messing around against his mother in law's promotion,

Grandma Rock and the just introduced Lars Anderson can turn season 2 into a Law and Order spinoff.

--
Ok, mind blown...Peter Miavia's shoot last name was Anderson.